How to Protect Your Fated Mate (Hated and Fated #3)

Chapter 1

Why is Coming Back from the Dead Always Such a Hassle?

Harper

A good detective prepares for anything.

Bloodthirsty monsters, homicidal maniacs, foes with supernatural strength and deadly intent, none of it rattles me.

As an Alpha werewolf and longtime detective, I’ve seen and done it all.

Tracked killers through the seediest parts of supernatural cities, hunted down demons from literal hell dimensions.

I’ve taken on murderers, liars, and every monster imaginable.

And I’ve certainly been in worse positions than this one. But at the moment, it’s hard to remember anything ever being more annoying than Kevin ‘Dodger’ Williamson.

“Hey. Can you hear me?”

Dodger and I sit across from each other in the drab breakfast nook of a budget-friendly chain hotel, trapped in a purgatory of beige walls and framed prints of forgettable landscapes.

The company isn’t any better.

“Hey, the building is on fire,” I announce. “We need to evacuate immediately.”

No response. Headphones are stuffed over his ears, drowning out everything but his music.

Head down and totally closed off, his long black hair falls over his eyes as he eats.

No way in hell is the cereal that interesting.

Every choice here is off brand, the toast could double as cardboard, and the coffee machine sputters like it’s on its last gasp.

Being patient is part of the job as a detective. But this isn’t some perp I’m waiting out until he cracks. I’m doing him a favor by keeping our business off the books. Dodger doesn’t seem too grateful. Didn’t anyone teach moody necromancers manners?

“Hey,” I say for the third time, waving my hand directly in front of his face.

He scowls up at me like I’m interrupting something of vital importance. “What?”

“Sugar?” I ask.

He huffs, giving me an eyeroll so huge it can be seen from space as he pushes the sugar toward me and cranks up his music even louder, retreating back into his self-imposed exile.

It’s going to be a long day.

How did we end up here? I ponder that as I dump way too much sugar into the sludge passing for coffee.

I was supposed to haul accused killer Marlow Maddox back to Brighton in cuffs.

Simple fugitive retrieval, until I tracked him to Concordia and discovered he wasn’t a murderer after all.

His supposed victim, Kevin “Dodger” Williamson, was sitting across the table, very much alive and slurping the milk from his cereal, annoying the hell out of me.

Dodger faked his death and staged it to look like an accident.

Nobody was supposed to take the fall for it.

Clearing Marlow’s name is the only reason he surfaced at all.

But Dodger refuses to return to Brighton, insisting the real danger—my police chief—still lurks there.

According to Dodger, my boss is corrupt to the core.

Now I’m stuck with a feisty, fledgling necromancer who’s about as easy to get information from as a brick wall. Snapping my fingers near his head and generally being aggravating eventually gets him to take off his headphones so we can talk.

“Tell me what happened,” I say.

Dodger gives me a look that could wither a cactus. “I already told you everything, like, ten times.”

“Tell me again.”

He rolls his eyes. “I ended up in Brighton by mistake, okay? Just passing through, minding my own business, trying to get a handle on these powers of mine that are a total downer.” He glances up, eyeing me.

“Is being a werewolf fun? It seems fun. You run and growl and howl at the moon. It’s like a free vacation where you get to be a dog.

Meanwhile I’m stuck with death and monsters. ”

“And Asher Rowan?” I question, ignoring the attempt to get off track. “How does he fit in?”

He sighs and swirls his spoon through the milk in his cereal bowl. “It turns out that Brighton wasn’t the friendliest place for a practitioner of the illicit dark arts. But Rowan said he could help me.”

“And you just believed him?”

“Hey, I need to control these powers and nobody else was offering. I thought he was alright at first.” He huffs and stares down into his bowl. “But then I went over to his place for a book and he wouldn’t let me leave.”

“Why not?”

“Why was he keeping me prisoner? How the hell should I know? All I cared about at that point was getting out of there. I don’t know what his deal is or why he’s creepy and evil. All I know is that he is creepy and evil.”

“Don’t get defensive,” I say. “I’m just trying to understand.”

“There’s nothing else to understand. I ran from Brighton and came to Concordia, the city full of witches.

Did you know there are covens dedicated to never losing your car keys and seasoning food perfectly?

Concordia caters to every kind of witchcraft imaginable, except one.

Except necromancy.” Dodger scowls at me.

“And not only did I strike out in finding other witches like me, I got stuck with you.”

Dodger pointedly shoves his headphones back over his ears, tuning me out once again.

Trying to evaluate him isn’t easy. Dodger’s young, just barely old enough to drink.

He’s skinny, all sharp angles and ghostly pale skin, with a curtain of black hair perpetually falling into his eyes.

Sure, his feisty attitude and waifish, ethereal good looks might be appealing in other circumstances, but not while I’m on the clock.

Do I trust him? Dodger went to the trouble of faking his death and finding Alpha bodyguards to hide and protect him while in the witch-run city.

He’s clearly terrified of something. Not only is someone well-connected supposedly gunning for him, he’s a fledgling necromancer who stumbled onto the supernatural world and doesn’t know how to control his powers yet.

Is he telling me the full truth? Unclear.

He doesn’t trust me. Until I know for sure whether his claims are true or not, I can’t share too much with the force back home.

My bosses back in Brighton are breathing down my neck after I let Marlow go free.

They’re demanding answers about the case and exactly what ‘new evidence’ warranted releasing a suspected murderer.

I’ve got nothing to give them except a dead man who isn’t dead and a chief who might be everything Dodger claims he is.

“—building is on fire,” Dodger says, waving a hand in front of my face.

“No, it’s not.” I’d smell the smoke.

“Had to get your attention somehow. You’re hogging the sugar.”

I stare at Dodger while passing it back, the defiance practically radiating off of him. He’s not going to make this easy. I’m stuck with him and a mess that’s getting messier by the second.

“We’re going to find a way out of this,” I say, more to myself than to him.

“Good luck with that,” he laughs. “Me being dead was a lot simpler.”

He’s right. But I’m not about to admit it.